I think Ill probably set her up with Avast v5 Free, Windows FW, and MBAM for on demand only. Ill be removing access to IE and installing FF with ABP and WOT.

How is Pandas detection rate compared to Avast? I know they are both light, but she is sort of tech dumb so the better detection rate the better for her and the less work I have to deal with in the future.

I have to say I don't really know the difference between the detection rate of avast and Panda. I think they don't really differ, as far as I know the paid Panda is a little better than avast. So I think they really won't differ. But something I know is that Panda Cloud 1.1 is coming quite soon with a lot of improvements. But both programs are good choices.

My personal opinion that IE is not less safe than FF (when you install addons FF also quickly becomes quite heavy on a netbook), next to that some (not really techy) people might find Adblock annoying. And maybe McAfee SiteAdvisor might be a better alternative to WOT, since WOT is based on community reputation and not directly on safety.

And maybe McAfee SiteAdvisor might be a better alternative to WOT, since WOT is based on community reputation and not directly on safety.

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My $.02 on this - McAfee has tons of bogus/questionable 'red alerts' for completely legit sites and getting them rescan and reclassify those is about next to impossible unless they've misclassified someone like M$. So, I wouldn't really rely on this at all.

I used SiteAdvisor for some time and watched it grow to a bloated, running a full time service (even when you're not browsing) beast. I can no longer recommend it at all, as beyond the bloat, it often wrongly rates siites as doktornotor mentions. WOT is the real deal. In my experience, seldom is it wrong. User ratings is IMO, the best way to rate websites if it is policed well. And from my position, WOT is.

One thing I have done to my Win 7 netbook that nabbed a bit of battery use time was to increase the minimum processor state (both battery and AC settings.) This made it noticeably more responsive. A trade-off for sure but worth it!

I think Ill probably set her up with Avast v5 Free, Windows FW, and MBAM for on demand only. Ill be removing access to IE and installing FF with ABP and WOT.

How is Pandas detection rate compared to Avast? I know they are both light, but she is sort of tech dumb so the better detection rate the better for her and the less work I have to deal with in the future.

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I have a similar netbook and this is the exact setup I have right now, with the addition of Sandboxie.

I am studying firewalls and have not decided. I'm not sure I know enough to use the windows firewall the way I want. I'll watch this thread.

I dont trust McAfee farther than I can throw it. Ive seen way to many issues with McAfee products in general on computers.

She prefers FF over IE so thats what she gets. Shes not getting a ton of add-ons. Just the basic java, ABP, and WOT and thats it.

Ive got 2Gbs of spare RAM in an HP laying around, but I havent swapped it out yet. The HP is up for sale and if it doesnt sell then Ill take it apart until then Id like to keep it in a single piece.

The CPU in this particular netbook is the N450 which supposedly helps battery life last longer than the N280. It gets 11 hours of battery life which is insane. I think I can afford to trade some CPU power for battery life. Ill probably end up with 9-10 hours instead of 11, no big deal.

In real-time all you need are these two: Outpost free (firewall plus HIPS) and Prevx free (antivirus). Light as a feather & trouble free.

Prevx free gives you alerts if it detects malware BUT it doesn't block the malware. Therefore, you also need Returnil free. Use Returnil to make an image of your drive C at least 2X/week. If Prevx ever reports malware, just restore a recent clean image.

- Turn on DEP for everything. At the very least it does no harm, unless you like to run tons of badly programmed Win9x apps. (And I'm not sure those would run on 7 anyway.)

- Windows 7 doesn't have AppLocker but SRP can be enabled using Pretty Good Security. The combination of UAC at maximum and SRP (set up for a limited user) should be pretty strong I would think; if it's not strong enough for you though, you can use SuRun from a limited account. This setup is a bit inconvenient, because stuff can't be installed locally (you have to put apps in C:\Program Files if you want them to run limited), but I doubt that any drive-by download could get past it.

You could obviously use third-party apps in addition, but that might just be overkill. The only issue, I'd think, would be recognizing when the system is infected, which I guess PrevX could do as bellgamin suggested.

(Though I will be blunt: I do not like PrevX. The combination of high false positive rates in my experience, and asking people to pay for removal of present malware, strikes me as... well, not rogue-like, but too close for comfort. But whether you decide to use it is not my decision.)

I wouldn't trust any cloud based AV unless you are online all the time (with speedy and stable connection...)

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If Im not online I cant download an infection and if thats the case every thing on the PC has already been scanned. Explain to me how I could get infected in the PC is cleaned and I dont have access to download malicious files?

If Im not online I cant download an infection and if thats the case every thing on the PC has already been scanned. Explain to me how I could get infected in the PC is cleaned and I dont have access to download malicious files?

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You noted earlier...

whitedragon551 said:

...She mainly got the laptop for ... and college course work.

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USB thumb drive from a classmate exchanging notes/project work/etc. You have a much better sense of whether or not that's a germane scenario, and it may not be.

That wont happen. Her course work is online. We just had a baby and shes recovering so she took online classes rather than at the campus. Im sure after she gets back into the swing of things course work will be emailed between the students and thats a moot point since she has to be online to receive the email.

You have a much better sense of whether or not that's a germane scenario

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I don't think it's germane. Italian maybe, or french, but not germane.
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But seriously...

Han said:

I used SiteAdvisor for some time and watched it grow to a bloated, running a full time service (even when you're not browsing) beast. I can no longer recommend it at all, as beyond the bloat, it often wrongly rates siites as doktornotor mentions. WOT is the real deal. In my experience, seldom is it wrong.

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Malware Bytes MBAM-PRO's IP-Blocking is another good option.

Gullible Jones said:

I do not like PrevX. ...asking people to pay for removal of present malware, strikes me as... well, not rogue-like, but too close for comfort.

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Many software companies offer free versions that lack some features present in their NON-free versions. Examples include but are not limited to Avira, Avast, & Outpost. I assume the free versions are to demonstrate a good level of utility & quality that will encourage the user to want to buy the full-featured NON-free version. Business is business -- otherwise: why buy the cow when they are giving away all the milk?

The Prevx freebie is a superb watchdog, having all the *important* power of the paid version except for cleaning. When the freebie is used with an imager, it is a very strong set-up IMO. Besides, I do not have confidence in the ability of ANY program to remove ALL traces of malware that happens to infect my computer (heavens forbid).

I think I may toss Avast on instead of Panda. Panda doesnt offer the customization that I would prefer and it doesnt offer options to eradicate "infections". God forbid an "infection" was a needed file and an FP at that.